Why Google Is Wrong To Obsess About Facebook

Posted on: April 29, 2012

I closed my Facebook account several months ago and have since enjoyed
time not spent on the social network, spending it much more productively
and enjoyably elsewhere. Now, for full disclosure: being in web
development I can not ignore Facebook so I still have a developer
account, to keep up with the platform, but I do not use Facebook for
anything personal.

I did not close my account because of Facebook's attitude towards
privacy. I did understand privacy implications; I did have all the
"right" settings configured to minimize the impact and while slightly
annoyed with their approach (disregard?) to privacy, I was generally OK
to continue using the service. But I closed the account when it simply
stopped providing meaningful benefit to me.

And that is the key to most social networks: the novelty wears off quite
quickly. Initially they seem like the best thing since sliced bread, but
soon enough it's just the same boring routine, turning into a waste of
time eventually. In order to not sound fixated on Facebook, it was even
more so the case with Quora, for me. Initial reaction to Quora was
amazing. I could ask a question to a GitHub founder and get a response
in a day. Direct response! How cool is that? But then again: how many
"Githubs" am I going to find on Quora, and how many founders of those do
I care to ask a question to? The model is not sustainable if you want
people coming back every day. And social networks can not survive
without users coming back every day, even: several times a day.

Of course: nobody understands this trait of social networks better than
Mark Zuckerberg. That's why he keeps the company constantly on the edge:
always changing things, always adding features. This is why he turned
Facebook into a platform, rather than a single app: so other companies
could join into the eco-system and help innovate, help diversify. This
is why Facebook has been as successful as it has, and why nobody even
remembers MySpace, anymore.

However, it is also why Google should stop obsessing about Facebook. The
thing is, Google provides an essential service: search for a vast amount
of content. As far as they keep being good at it, there will never be
time when we do not need search or when we decide we are too bored with
search. Don't get me wrong: Google still needs to keep innovating to
improve the service and adapt to changing demand, but the core business
model is sustainable in perpetuity: it's an essential service. Facebook
is not. Much like MySpace, Facebook can go away and nobody would as much
as flinch.

I think it's a safe bet to say that: in 5 years Facebook will either not
exist at all, or be so different that it will have almost nothing to do
with the Facebook we know today. I am sure that the same statement is
not true for Google Search.

This is why, in my opinion, Google executives should stop obsessing
about how much traffic Facebook gets today and what Facebook does TODAY,
instead they should worry about their own bread and butter: search, and
they should target where Facebook may be going tomorrow. What if next
time Zuckerberg pivots his company he decides to "reinvent" search?

THAT would be something to worry about, but as far as Google Plus goes,
sorry to break it: it's a waste of Google's time.